IEPHTE (Heb. Jiphtāh). — A Gileadite warrior and judge of Israel (I Sam. 12:11), whose deeds are narrated in Iudc. 10:6–12:7.
The illegitimate son of Gilead, driven out by his legitimate brothers, he took refuge in the region of Tob, at the sources of the Jordan; there, amid the harsh life of a raider, alone against all (Gen. 16:12), he succeeded in imposing his courage and prowess (like David in the wilderness of Judah and Zeph), and became the leader of a large band of men who, like himself, had fled or been driven out of their clan. When his compatriots, oppressed by the Ammonites who, encamped in Gilead, were making incursions even into Judah, turned to Yahweh to be delivered and, having removed idolatry, rose up in arms, yet found no one among them willing to assume command, they sent to ask I. to accept the difficult task. I. accepted, after making the elders and his tribe swear in the name of Yahweh that, after the victory, they would grant him power. It was an attempt, following that of Gideon, to establish a monarchical principality; an attempt that ended with I.
The situation was difficult, and I., while trying to gather armed men, began negotiations. When these failed, I., trusting in Yahweh, to whom he vowed that he would sacrifice the first person who, on his return, came out of his house to meet him, attacked the Ammonites suddenly, swiftly and decisively. He routed them in many victorious engagements; he reconquered twenty Israelite cities and liberated Gilead as far as the Jordan. The victor was met, first among the other maidens, by his only daughter, in the customary ritual celebration. At this sight I. raised a mournful lament. The daughter encouraged her father; she asked only for two months to mourn with her companions in the mountains for her «virginity», that is, for the flower of her youth, cut off; when the two months had passed, I. sacrificed her.
The Ephraimites, as they had already done with Gideon, rose up against I. because he had won without them. I., who had invited them in vain at the moment of danger, bloodily repulsed their insolence. At the fords of the Jordan, the Ephraimites, identified by their pronunciation of the word sibboleth, «ear of grain», which they instead pronounced sibboleth, «stream», were killed (an analogous episode occurred during the Sicilian Vespers: the French were exposed by mispronouncing «ceci»).
I. is a fervent Yahwist; for him Yahweh knows how to protect his people against other peoples and their gods (Iudc. 21:11, 24–27; cf. Hebr. 11:32 ff.). Yet his faith is rudimentary, bearing the stain of human sacrifice, which I. carried out in his ignorance of the law of Sinai and in imitation of the Canaanites (the Moabite king Mesha did the same: II Reg. 3:27). The decline from pure Yahwism begins here, characteristic of that period of fragmentation, under the deleterious influence of Canaanite culture.